Xala: A Novel was written by the Senegalese writer and filmmaker Ousmane Sembène. The satirical work was originally published in France in 1974 and released in the United States in 1976. In 1975, it was adapted into a film directed by Sembène. The postcolonial novel deals with the aftermath of Senegal’s formal independence from France on August 20, 1960—two years after the country had become a republic. Senegal celebrates its Independence Day on April 4, however. Nègritude poet Léopold Sédar Senghor became the country’s first president. Senghor was known for his willingness to cooperate with Senegal’s former colonizer. This cooperative spirit earned him criticism from those who believed that he led as a neo-colonialist. Xala is critical of the powers that prevailed during Senghor’s presidency, which lasted from 1960-81.

Other African writers have also explored the broken promises of Indigenous African political and business leaders in the postcolonial era. Nigerian writer Chinua Achebe, for example, covered similar themes in his satirical and ironically titled novel, A Man of the People.

Plot Summary

El Hadji Abdou Kader Beye’s wedding to N’Gone, a young local woman, coincided with the first-time promotion of a Senegalese man to the position of president of the country’s Chamber of Commerce. At the wedding reception, N’Gone’s aunt and godmother (Badyen), Yay Bineta, presided over the festivities. It was Yay Bineta who had secured the match between El Hadji and her niece to get 19-year-old N’Gone out of her parents’ house and into the arms of a man who could care for her financially. El Hadji purchased N’Gone a villa, as he had his first two wives. Both of El Hadji’s wives attended the wedding—the pious and undemanding Adja Awa Astou and the fiery and materialistic Oumi N’Doye. Both women quietly feared being superseded by the much younger and virginal third co-wife.

After the wedding reception, El Hadji and N’Gone retired to her villa. Yay Bineta and an elderly woman carrying a rooster arrived a short while after consummation of the marriage would have taken place. When they entered the bridal chamber, N’Gone confessed to the elder women that she was still a virgin. El Hadji had been cursed with a xala, meaning that he was unable to get and maintain an erection. El Hadji left the bridal chamber, crestfallen, and went outside. His chauffeur, Modu, waited for him beside El Hadji’s Mercedes-Benz.

Modu took El Hadji to his boss’s import-export shop, which specialized in the sale of grain. In the days that followed, El Hadji went to various shamans and consumed numerous aphrodisiacs to restore his lost erection. During a visit to a seer, El Hadji learned that the xala had been caused by someone close to him. This led him to suspect both Adja and Oumi N’Doye of being the culprits.

In his mad pursuit to undo the curse, El Hadji neglected his business interests. His families continued to make financial demands on him, however, and Oumi N’Doye, fearing neglect, demanded more of his attention. Modu, who was loyal to his boss and sympathetic to the powerful man’s condition, offered to take El Hadji to a healer who lived in a remote village. El Hadji took the younger man’s advice. One evening, they visited Sereen Mada—a healer whose reputation was already known in elite circles. True to his legend, Sereen Mada restored El Hadji’s lost erection. Having no cash on him, El Hadji paid Sereen Mada with a check and ensured the healer that his account had sufficient funds.

As soon as Modu and El Hadji returned to Dakar, El Hadji went to visit N’Gone. When he arrived at her villa, she and Yay Bineta told him that they could not consummate the marriage because N’Gone was on her period. Frustrated, El Hadji went to Oumi N’Doye’s villa, where he eagerly showed his second wife that his sense of manhood had been restored.

El Hadji’s happiness was disrupted, however, by his colleagues’ frustration over his neglect of business affairs. A meeting with the businessmen’s group led to a hard conversation about the National Grain Board not having been paid for the rice that El Hadji had clearly sold. Ultimately, El Hadji was voted out of the group. This ouster was followed by El Hadji’s inability to acquire a loan to pay the board back for the rice sale, the losses of his Mercedes and the minibus that took his children to school, and the repossessions of Oumi N’Doye and N’Gone’s villas. El Hadji had clearly borrowed beyond his means and was left with no financial recourse. Oumi N’Doye and her children were forced to return to her impoverished family, and N’Gone went to live with hers.

Meanwhile, Sereen Mada still awaited payment. He arrived at El Hadji’s shop one day, accompanied by Modu. The healer had asked Modu not to reveal his identity. When El Hadji saw Sereen Mada, he failed to recognize him. As Sereen Mada left the shop in a taxi and returned to his village, he worked to restore El Hadji’s xala.

El Hadji went to live with Adja Awa Astou, whose villa had not been repossessed. The chanting beggar who usually sang and collected coins outside of El Hadji’s shop, and whose presence was a nuisance to the protagonist, learned from Modu about El Hadji’s troubles. The beggar claimed that he could help El Hadji recover his lost erection. He would not demand any money, he noted. He only wanted El Hadji to do what the beggar asked.

In the following days, El Hadji, Adja Awa Astou, and their daughter, Rama, were present to see a group of Dakar’s beggars arrive in their exclusive neighborhood. The outcasts entered Adja’s home as if it were theirs and proceeded to mock and provoke the startled family. The chanting beggar reminded El Hadji of who he was. He helped El Hadji, who had made no secret of his willingness to cheat to get ahead, of how the businessman had swindled his family out of land that they had owned and used his connections to ensure that the beggar would not have the means to fight back.

To force El Hadji to atone for his crimes, the beggar led his group in taking turns spitting on El Hadji. Adja and Rama watched in horror as El Hadji stoically submitted to the degrading ritual, even removing all of his clothes. One of the beggars placed a bridal crown on his head as the others continued to spit at him. Alarmed by the sight of the vagabonds in the wealthy enclave, El Hadji’s neighbors had called the police, but the family insisted on the beggars’ rights to remain present. Still, the officers waited on alert outside of Adja Awa Astou’s villa, with their hands poised on their guns, ready to fire.